Pentamidine treatment
Wendy,
Following my transplant at City of Hope in 1998, I had serveral months of prophylactic pentamidine treatments.
It was done in the pulmonary clinic on an outpatient basis. I sat alone in a little examining room. A respiratory therapist would add the prescribed pentamidine to an inhaler device, which I held in mouth and breathed in and out until all of the medicine had been vaporized.
It usually took about 20 minutes but would leave me very wheezy for a least a day and sometimes two afterwards. Finally, I learned there was a premed called Albulterol that could be taken (same method with the inhaler) before the pentatamidine. This made the process take a little longer, maybe 30 minutes total, but removed the problem of post-treatment wheezing.
These treatments were mostly boring and the medicine has a rather bad (but not unbearable or naseating) taste. There was no monitoring afterwards. The therapist would check back periodically to see if I'd finished the treatment and as soon as I was done, I left.
Let me know if you have any other questions. My memory of these details is rather hazy but I could dig out my notes if you need some more help.
Regards,
Ruth
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Diagnosed AA 10/96, MDS/RA 6/98, MUD/BMT 10/6/98
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